The pasture renovation went well. Lots of “coyote brush” removed and lots more room for the horses to move about. Coyote brush (or chaparral as some call it) can serve as a cover for coyotes, and a few weeks ago, that would have been reason enough to have it removed. A family of coyotes made it’s home directly behind the shed near the barn.

Aside from the racket the young ones made at various times a day, it was becoming somewhat alarming that the juveniles didn’t seem afraid of humans and were awfully comfortable hanging around the barn and napping on the manure pile. Concerned for human safety and barn cat safety motivated a call to a local live trapper who shocked me by saying the only alternative was to shoot the coyotes or live trap them and euthanize them! (Apparently it’s against the law to re-locate them.) That was beyond disturbing so I made a call to a local wild animal rescue where I was given the name of a man who teaches at Cal Poly who is an coyote expert. I called him and he said he doubted killing them was necessary. He told me so much about their family structures, how different family groups lay claim to certain areas, etc. And he introduced me to “coyote hazing” which consists of chasing them rattling and banging noisy objects. He said to make them believe humans are unpredictable.

One night as my husband and I arrived home from dinner out, we saw one of the juveniles (they are cute) lounging on the manure pile. Scott chased him and threw clods of dirt at him and they have not been back! Amazing. Of course we have coyotes on our property. They live in this area and have lived here a lot longer than we have. But they are back to being rarely seen and certainly not a menace. Every now and then a beloved barn cat (we are unofficially a feral/unwanted cat sanctuary too it seems) disappears, but that is life on a ranch. So far coexisting is working.